An attractive example of the third state of Hendrick de Leth’s rare large map of the American continent which extends to cover both the Pacific and Atlantic Oceans along with their Asian, European, and African coastlines. The first state is considered a proof. It is an amalgam of two earlier maps, the very rare wall map by Nicholas de Fer of 1713, and Henri Abraham Chatelain’s of 1719. Although it covers such a large area, the focus of the map as stated in the title is the ‘Mer du Sud’, or Pacific Ocean.

Hendrick de Leth (1703-66) was born in Amsterdam, the son of the engraver and bookseller Andries de Leth (1662-31). His father had acquired the business of Nicolaas Visscher II. Hendrick joined his father and subsequently the bookseller’s guild in 1728. This map is undated and was separately published. It is usually ascribed the date of c.1730.

The map displays the tracks of famous navigators such as Ferdinand Magellan and Willem Schouten, along with the tracks of the Spanish Manila galleons across the Pacific Ocean. Indeed, the whole map is focused on global trade, an activity the Dutch were heavily involved in. Trade routes are shown across the Oceans. As with the earlier maps from which it is derived, it has a French bias with the English colonies in North America for example, confined to the east coast. As might be expected of this timeframe the Mississippi River is mistakenly depicted flowing into the Gulf of Mexico too far to the west. The Great Lakes are well displayed unlike California which is here still depicted as an island. By this date the myth which had started in 1622 had been refuted by Father Eusebio Kino in a publication of 1705. Throughout this whole period maps were published with California as a peninsula as not everyone had been convinced. Depictions of it as an island continued until the middle of the eighteenth century.

New Holland or present-day Australia is curiously depicted with a confused coastline incorporating ‘Terre de Quir’ and New Zealand. It reflects the yet to be charted eastern coastline of Australia and the accurate mapping of New Zealand undertaken by James Cook later in the century.

The map contains several insets. Over the north Pacific an ornate cartouche includes three plans of the ports of Vera Cruz, Rio de Janeiro, and Havana. This replaces one of Niagara Falls as seen in the original Nicolas de Fer map. In the upper right corner of the map is a map of the Straits of Gibraltar oriented at ninety degrees. From left to right across the bottom are several more cartouche which conveniently enable de Leth to evade the issue of the presence of a southern continent or not. Lower left are plans of Porto Bello and the Isthmus of Panama. The south Atlantic is covered by an extremely attractive vignette view of the Cape of Good Hope and Table Mountain, at the time a significant colony for the Dutch in their trade with the East Indies. The dating of this third state likely coincides with the commencement of the French and Indian War in 1754. Koeman (1967-70 p. 267; Leighly (1972) 169; McLaughlin & Mayo. (1995) 220; Norwich (1983) 320; Tooley (1964) no. 94.